Times of London, 7 Feb 10: A FORMER Palestinian intelligence officer has become the first woman to be appointed governor of Ramallah, the unofficial capital of the West Bank, by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas as part of a crackdown on Hamas, the hardline Islamist faction.
Leila Ghannam, 35, who has a doctorate in psychology but rose to be a captain in the Palestinian intelligence service, has been personally charged by the president with ensuring that Hamas is unable to seize power from Abbas’s ruling Fatah party on the West Bank as they did in Gaza in 2007. “Any attempt to mount an uprising by Hamas, any slightly illegal act will be met with an iron fist,” she said at her modest fifth floor office overlooking Ramallah. As governor she is in command of all the armed forces in the region. . . .
. . . . During her earlier position with Fatah she worked closely with overseas intelligence services, including MI6. “My intelligence experience, like my degree in psychology, helps me to carry out my job,” she said. . . . .
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